Guðmundur Kamban (8 June 1888 – 5 May 1945) was an

Iceland Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its s ...

ic playwright and novelist.

Biography

He was born in the farm of Litlibær in Garðasókn, Iceland, son of a merchant of an old and well-known Icelandic family. He graduated from the College of Reykjavík, where he received honoris causa in literature and language. While still at college, he was made assistant editor of the best known newspaper in Iceland, edited by

Björn Jónsson Björn Jónsson (8 October 1846 – 24 November 1912) was minister for Iceland from 31 March 1909 to 14 March 1911. He was the father of Sveinn Björnsson, the only regent of Iceland and first president of Iceland. Björn became Minister for ...

. In 1906 his psychic abilities were also investigated by the Experimental Society founded by

Einar Hjörleifsson Kvaran Einar Gísli Hjörleifsson Kvaran (6 December 1859 in Vallanes, Iceland as Einar Hjörleifsson – 21 May 1938 in Reykjavík) was an Icelandic editor, novelist, poet, playwright and prominent spiritualist. Life Einar Kvaran was the son of Re ...

: as a

clairvoyant Clairvoyance (; ) is the magical ability to gain information about an object, person, location, or physical event through extrasensory perception. Any person who is claimed to have such ability is said to be a clairvoyant () ("one who sees cl ...

, he succeeded in divining the contents of closed books, and as an automatic writer he penned works supposedly by Hans Christian Andersen,

Jónas Hallgrímsson Jónas Hallgrímsson (16 November 1807 – 26 May 1845) was an Icelandic poet, author and naturalist. He was one of the founders of the Icelandic journal Fjölnir (journal), ''Fjölnir'', which was first published in Copenhagen in 1835. The mag ...

, and Snorri Sturluson. But he lost his

mediumistic Mediumship is the practice of purportedly mediating communication between familiar spirits or spirits of the dead and living human beings. Practitioners are known as "mediums" or "spirit mediums". There are different types of mediumship or spir ...

abilities after a serious illness. In 1908 he adopted the family name Kamban in place of his birth name (Guðmundur Jónsson) and advocated a change in

Icelandic naming conventions Icelandic names are names used by people from Iceland. Icelandic surnames are different from most other naming systems in the modern Western world by being patronymic or occasionally matronymic: they indicate the father (or mother) of the child ...

. In 1910, he proceeded to the

University of Copenhagen The University of Copenhagen ( da, Københavns Universitet, KU) is a prestigious public research university in Copenhagen, Denmark. Founded in 1479, the University of Copenhagen is the second-oldest university in Scandinavia after Uppsala Unive ...

, where he specialized in literature and received his master's degree. In 1914 he published his first play, ''Hadda Padda'' which was endorsed by

Georg Brandes Georg Morris Cohen Brandes (4 February 1842 – 19 February 1927) was a Danish critic and scholar who greatly influenced Scandinavian and European literature from the 1870s through the turn of the 20th century. He is seen as the theorist behind ...

and shown in the Danish Royal Theatre with Kamban as assistant director. He later married an actress from the play, Agnete Egeberg, and they had a daughter in 1921. In 1915 Kamban moved to New York, intending to establish himself as an English language writer. He was not successful and moved back to Copenhagen with his wife in 1917. In 1920 he achieved success at Dagmarteatret with ''We Murderers'' and was employed as a director at the theatre. He is also the author of spirited and erudite historical novels based on the Icelandic sagas, including ''Skalholt'' (4 vols., 1930–32; tr. of Vol. I and II, ''The Virgin of Skalholt'', 1935) and ''I See a Wondrous Land'' (1936, tr. 1938). Kamban directed plays, wrote novels and produced motion pictures in Copenhagen until 1934, when he moved to London. Not finding success there, he relocated to Berlin in 1935 and lived there until 1938, when he moved back to Copenhagen. On the 100th anniversary of his birth, his play ''Marmari'', or ''Marble'', was produced by the

National Theatre of Iceland The National Theatre of Iceland (NTI) ( is, Þjóðleikhúsið, pronounced ) in Reykjavík, is the national theatre of Iceland. The theater, designed by Guðjón Samúelsson, was formally opened on 20 April 1950. Since 2020, the artistic directo ...

Death

On 5 May 1945, as the German forces in Denmark surrendered, Kamban was murdered at a Copenhagen restaurant in front of his wife and daughter, by Danish partisans. His body was returned to Iceland and he was buried with honors in Reykjavik. Although known by Danish authorities, the name of Kamban's killer has never been revealed publicly. During the

German occupation of Denmark At the outset of World War II in September 1939, Denmark declared itself neutral. For most of the war, the country was a protectorate and then an occupied territory of Germany. The decision to occupy Denmark was taken in Berlin on 17 December ...

, Kamban received German research funding and came to be seen as a collaborator although a police investigation found no evidence that he betrayed the resistance to the Nazi.

References

Sources

We murderers; a play in three acts

Guðmundur Kamban

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Kamban, Guomundur Gudmundur Kamban Gudmundur Kamban Kamban, Gudmundur Kamban, Gudmundur Executed Danish collaborators with Nazi Germany Danish murder victims Male murder victims People murdered in Denmark 1945 murders in Denmark